Chinese Scientist Says
Bird-Flu Virus Is Stable

No Evidence Exists H5n1
Is Mutating Into Human Threat

By
Nicholas ZamiskaStaff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Updated Dec. 12, 2005 11:59 pm ET

BEIJING &ndash; Although human cases of bird flu are mounting in China, the virus here is currently stable, not mutating toward a form readily transmissible among humans, a top Chinese government scientist said.

Shu Yuelong, director of China's national influenza laboratory in Beijing, also said amantadine -- a drug that was largely discredited when the virus was thought to have grown resistant to it -- may be effective in treating avian influenza in people after all, though that evidence is preliminary.